teacher tuesday...third day of third grade

I've decided that since teaching is such a big part of what I do, I'll try to dedicate Tuesdays to share some of the fun things going on in my classroom. If you're a teacher and blogger, leave me a link to your blog in the comment section and let me know what fun things you're doing in YOUR classroom.
After all, all great teachers stole borrowed their great ideas from someone else!!

Third Day of Third Grade

Last Friday we celebrated the third day of third grade. It's perfect for us because it always falls on a Friday (unless of course they decide to change the schedule on us).
Everything we did revolved around the number 3.

My favorite part of the day was when I read The Three Armadillies Tuff. It's such a cute story. A southwestern version of The Three Billy Goats Gruff. We recorded the story elements on a chart and compared the two stories.

We also made a giant number 3 out of butcher paper. I used an overhead projector to make it really big and trace it. Then I made puzzle piece shapes (one for each student) out of the three shape. I cut those out ahead of time and then gave one puzzle piece to each child. They drew their three favorite things on their piece and when everyone was finished, they had to work together to put the puzzle together. I didn't tell them what it was supposed to look like, but most of them remembered seeing the giant three in the hall last year. It's a great activity for team work and collaboration.

I think creativity and art are a very important part of school. So we ended the day with an art project.

I drew a number 3 on a piece of paper. One for each student. I told them to look at their 3 and create a picture with the 3 hidden somewhere. They were very clever and came up some really unique ideas!

These are just 3 of the activities we did. It was such a fun day.

Come on teachers! What fun things do you do?